They weren’t really in any position to look down on her, though, were they, she thought, perking up slightly?

    Not that she’d seen that had ever really stopped anybody from doing so. They always found an excuse for themselves.

    Angry male voices from the observatory alerted her to the fact that the men had left their quarters. Holly sat up, listening intently. Her alertness made it clear that she hadn’t actually been sleeping any of the time.

    “What’s going on?”

    “Your guess is as good as mine.”

    Holly was silent for several moments, listening. “Do you think we should go out and try to break it up before they fight?”

    Sybil sent her a sour look. “Do you honestly think we could? Anyway, I don’t care if they beat Spencer senseless. He’s an asshole.”

    Holly seemed to consider that. “Yes… but… What if he beats Powell and Kushbu senseless?”

    Sybil blinked at her, digesting that, and then surged off the bed. The last thing she wanted was to end up at Spencer’s mercy the way he’d been acting! She didn’t know about Powell, but Kushbu was about as big around as a thread! Spencer would mop the floor with him.

    Holly, who’d suggested ‘they’ try to stop the argument before it escalated into a fight, followed Sybil to the door and then hovered in the doorway as Sybil strode into the observatory. Sybil didn’t even realize she’d lost her backup until she’d reached the men. “What’s going on?”

    Spencer, who’d been chest to chest with Powell, snarling in his face, whirled to look at her. His expression was ugly. He looked her up and down as if she was a pile of shit and curled his lips back. “Stay out of it, whore!”

Chapter Seven

    Absolute shock hit Sybil as if she’d been punched. Never in her life, certainly not in her military career, had she been assaulted in such a way. Rage chased the shock in a counter wave. She balled her hands into fists. “What did you say to me, Corporal?”

    He didn’t get the chance to respond. Powell grabbed him by one shoulder and half spun him around to punch him in the face. Caught off guard, the blow was far more effective than it might have been otherwise. Spencer staggered away from the blow, trying to catch himself and lost the battle. Almost the moment he hit the floor, however, he rolled to his feet, uttered a bellow of rage, and charged Powell.

    Holly screamed ear-splittingly.

    “Have you completely lost your mind, Spencer?” Sybil shouted as he butted Powell with his head and shoulders, carrying him across the room and into the wall. She heard Powell’s head make a sickening sound as it struck the wall. His eyes rolled back in his head. He slid down the wall when Spencer released him and turned, fixing her with a deadly look.

    Her heart slammed against her chest wall, knocking the breath from her, but she shook it off, assuming a fighting stance. “Don’t do anything you’re going to regret, soldier!” she said warningly.

    Not surprisingly, he was too enraged to listen. He charged her. Sybil waited until the last possible moment. Instead of meeting his charge, however, she leapt out of the way, whirling as she landed and driving her foot into his back. Pain shot through her ankle. Gritting her teeth, she resumed an attack stance, watching Spencer as he slammed into the floor from her blow and then rolled up again. Before he could get from his knees to his feet, the door of the observatory flew open and Anka, followed by two other soldiers, raced inside. Anka caught Spencer around the shoulders and lifted him bodily from the floor as if he weighed no more than a child. Spencer wrestled to free himself from Anka’s hold and then abruptly threw himself forward and down, flipping Anka over his back.

    Sybil sucked in a sharp breath. Before Spencer could follow through, however, Anka was on his feet and facing his adversary. Spencer had been reduced by his rage to snarling and grunting, but he managed to throw a few insults in her direction as he attacked Anka, throwing three quick punches in succession. Anka blocked each strike and then slammed a fist into Spencer’s face. His head snapped back at the blow. His eyes rolled back into his head and he fell toward the floor like a felled tree, stiff as board.

    Aghast, Sybil stared down at the man. “Is he… dead?”

    “Not yet,” Anka growled, glaring at the unconscious man. He seemed to collect himself with an effort and tamp his anger. “Are you hurt?”

    Sybil looked down at her foot. “I think I might have sprained my ankle when I kicked him.”

    Surging toward her, he scooped her off her feet before she even realized his intention and carried her into her sleeping quarters, settling her on the bed. Crouching beside the bed, he gently lifted her leg, supporting the calf and foot, and studied the knot that had sprung up. His expression hardened. “I’ll have a droid scan it. It might be broken.”

    Sybil didn’t object. The pain had started to set in the moment the shock began to wear off. “Do you think Major Powell will be alright?”

    He studied her face for a long moment. “I’ll check on him,” he said abruptly, turning to go.

    The urge to stop him smote her as he reached the door but she curbed it. Listening intently, she struggled to interpret what was going on in the observatory, but discovered that Anka and his men were speaking their own language. After a few minutes, she saw one of the men who’d accompanied Anka carry Spencer out over his shoulder. Anka appeared in her door a few minutes later. “Powell has come around, but we’ll be taking him down for a scan to check his injuries.”

    “What are they going to do with Spencer?”

    His lips tightened. “He’s to be confined… alone.”

    She stopped him when he turned to go. “Anka.”

    He turned back, lifting his brows questioningly.

    “I’m sorry about the way I behaved this morning.”

    Surprise flickered in his eyes. “We’ll talk… later.”

    Disappointment wafted through her when he’d gone and anxiety. She couldn’t tell that her apology had had much impact. Swallowing the sudden impulse to cry for no damned reason at all, she settled back against her pillow and stared at the ceiling.

    “My god!” Holly muttered, plunking down on her own bunk weakly. “What in the world happened?”

    Sybil thought it was a rhetorical question, but she’d been trying to understand it herself. “I don’t know. According to his file, Spencer’s had some discipline problems in the past, but nothing like this. At a guess, he spent the night brooding over the fact that he was sent back here while we stayed to take part in the festival and was spoiling for a fight long before we got back. I think that only fueled the fire-the fact that none of us came back until this morning.”

    Holly cleared her throat. “I got to talking with Beckt-about their culture, you know?- and just completely lost track of time.”

    Sybil sent her a sour look. “You, too? That’s what happened to me-except I was talking to Anka.”

    Holly’s face reddened with anger. “Are you insinuating that I’m lying?”

    “Are you insinuating that I am?” Sybil shot back at her.

    “If that’s true, why was Spencer screaming ‘whore’ and ‘slut’ at you?”

    “Because he has a nasty mind and a fertile imagination?” Sybil retorted angrily. Why the hell was it that men could bed hop as much they pleased and yet the very damned moment a woman took a lover she was automatically a fucking whore? Was that just? Was that reasonable? It wasn’t right. It wasn’t fair, and yet it was fact of life-always had been, always would be. There were two standards-one for men and one for women. And the worst of it was that women were largely responsible for it! Here was Holly, judging her, when she didn’t have any right whatsoever to do so, and instantly believing Spencer just because he said so!